Meeting of the Parliament 18 June 2025
My apologies to Jackie Baillie. I had been anticipating slightly longer, so I am going to try to compress my comments; unfortunately, I now have even less time to do so.
We are targeting Scotland’s public support towards innovation, training and economic diversification. For example, we have helped Leonardo to develop civilian radar and sensing technologies, we have supported Raytheon in expanding into commercial aerospace and we have backed Walker Precision Engineering in its aerospace and medical technologies.
We are not only investing in businesses but in people, especially our young people. Scotland’s defence sector, like many others, depends on a skilled workforce, which is why the Government continues to make significant investments in science, technology, engineering and maths education and training. Last year alone, we invested more than £1.74 million in programmes that support the delivery of high-quality STEM learning in schools. We are supporting the future workforce through apprenticeships by backing around 25,500 new modern apprenticeships in 2025-26 and continuing to support more than 38,000 apprentices who are already in training, many of whom are in STEM fields that are critical to Scotland’s industrial future, including defence.
More than 80 per cent of apprentices in STEM start their training at higher levels, ensuring that we develop the advanced skills needed in high-tech sectors, including those that support aerospace, marine engineering and advanced manufacturing. We fund the young STEM leader programme, which has engaged more than 20,000 young people across every local authority in Scotland, and the STEM nation award programme, which has supported more than 8,800 teachers and almost 120,000 pupils in recognising and building excellence in STEM teaching.
We are embedding STEM in the heart of our education system and supporting our current economic sectors. That is future proofing our economy for decades to come. We are investing up to £2 million to develop engineering skills in the Glasgow city region in a programme designed by the Clyde maritime cluster in partnership with Skills Development Scotland, of which a key player is BAE Systems.
Just as we invest in the skills and technologies of the future, we must also ensure that our investment decisions reflect the kind of future that we want to build—one that is grounded in integrity and respect for human rights. That is why the Government signed up to the United Nations guiding principles on business and human rights and it is why our enterprise agencies operate a robust due diligence process to assess companies’ human rights records before funding is approved.
That is why we voted for the Labour amendment that committed Scottish Enterprise to reviewing its human rights due diligence checks, and we plan to update Parliament on that before recess.
Defence is a reserved matter under the Scotland Act 1998. Where UK Government funding is provided directly for munitions manufacturing, that is its prerogative. It is a matter that the Opposition is quick to remind us of in relation to how we spend our budget. Our approach recognises that defence is hugely important. Scotland will continue to play a key role in supporting our allies, including Ukraine. Our support will focus on creating high-skilled, sustainable jobs and supporting innovation across the defence sector.
The defence sector is vital to our economy, and it will remain so. We will continue to invest in defence-related innovation, skills and infrastructure to build a defence economy that is fit for the future, productive and proud.
I move amendment S6M-17981.3, to leave out from “; notes” to end and insert:
“, and in protecting national security, especially at a time of increased global instability, and notes that defence is a matter reserved to the UK Government under the Scotland Act 1998 and that the Scottish Government’s long-standing position is that public money should focus on diversification.”
16:15Motions, questions or amendments mentioned by their reference code.